How to configure nVIDIA graphics card under the Linux system

In the field of graphics chips, nVidia is a latecomer, its history is only half of ATi. At the beginning of 1993, NVIDIA was founded by Jen-Hsun Huang, Chris Malachowsky and Curtis Priem. However, nVidia is once again the strongest in the field of graphics processing chips. The Linux driver installation software toolkit from NVIDIA will automatically check the computer. Various details and automatic installation of various drivers. Here is a brief process of driver installation and upgrade. The Linux system comes with drivers that only include nVIDIA 2D acceleration. If you need better 3D acceleration, you need to install the nVIDIA dedicated driver software kit. 3D hardware acceleration is invaluable when you need to draw three-dimensional objects, such as games, 3D CAD, and 3D imaging. The application environment of this article is Red Had Enterprise Linux 4.0, nVIDIA graphics card model: ASUS N6200/TD/128M (6200AGP).

I. Preparations

Before configuring an nVIDIA graphics card, you need to know the following information about the installed system: display specifications, chip type of the display card, memory capacity of the display card, display The specification is used by X11 to determine the resolution and refresh rate of the display. These specifications can usually be found in the documentation that comes with the display, as well as on the manufacturer's website. Need to know the two range of numbers: vertical refresh rate and horizontal refresh rate. The chip type of the graphics card will determine which module X11 uses to drive the graphics hardware. Most hardware can be detected automatically, but it is useful to know that it automatically detects errors. The graphics card's memory size determines the resolution and color depth supported by the system. It is important to understand these limits. Because the driver installation may need to be compiled with the kernel, the kernel source code will be used. In addition, the compiler is also needed. Therefore, first determine the existence of the following software on your Linux system: kernel-source, Kernel, gcc, make. Open a terminal and check with the command:

# rpm -qa |  Grep gcc;rpm -qa |  Grep make;rpm -qa |  Grep kernel

Second, Linux 3D graphics related knowledge

· The XFree86 Project

XFree86 is developed by X11R6 originally for Intel X86 architecture PC X Window's system. XFree86 then evolved into an X Window System for almost all UNIX-like operating systems. XFree86 is an open source X11-based desktop infrastructure. The X Window System used in Red Hat 9 is XFree86 4.3. XFree86 no longer complies with the GPL license release since version 4.4 released in 2004, but follows the new XFree86 1.1 license. Since XFree86 is no longer licensed under the GPL license, many distributions no longer use XFree86 and instead use Xorg. The official XFree86 website is http://www.xfree86.org/

·The XOrg Foundation(X.org)

Xorg is an open source X released by the X.Org Foundation. The X service implemented by the Window system. Xorg is released under the GPL license. Xorg is based on XFree86 4.4RC2 and X11R6.6 code. The X.Org Foundation released X11R6.7 in April 2004. X11R6.8.2 was released in February 2005. Due to differences in the adoption of the new license in the final version of XFree86 4.4, the first version of the Xorg server, X11R6.7.0, was derived from XFree86 4.4 RC2 and added some changes to X11R6.6. Many developers of XFree86 have joined this more open project than XFree86. XOrg servers are becoming popular in open source Unix-style operating systems. It was adopted by the following distributions to replace XFree86: Gentoo Linux, Fedora Core, Slackware, SUSE, Mandrake Linux, Ubuntu Linux, etc. Basic features: Basically the same as xfree86. It has become mainstream and supports a lot. 7.0 is modular. 7.0 supports the use of xgl module, can achieve desktop 3d effect, very good. Official website: http://www.x.org/In the Linux use of the above two organizations of the driver can achieve 3D acceleration, since the KP and authorized modification events, XFree86 support rate is really down the trough, the major issues The edition has turned to Xorg. The latter of this article shall prevail.

·3D API

API is the abbreviation of Application Programming Interface, which means the interface of the application, and 3D API refers to the direct interface between the graphics card and the application. The 3D API allows programmers to design 3D software by simply calling the programs in its API, allowing the API to automatically communicate with the hardware drivers and launch powerful 3D graphics processing functions within the 3D chip, thereby greatly improving the 3D program. Design efficiency.

If you don't have a 3D API to develop a program, the programmer must understand all the graphics features to write a program that exactly matches the graphics card and play all the graphics performance. With the 3D API, the direct interface between the graphics card and the software, the programmer only needs to write the program code that conforms to the interface, so that the graphics card can be fully utilized without having to understand the specific performance and parameters of the hardware, which greatly simplifies the efficiency of program development. . Similarly, display chip manufacturers design their own hardware products according to standards to achieve optimal performance and better performance when the API calls hardware resources. With the 3D API, it is possible to achieve maximum range compatibility of hardware and software from different manufacturers. For example, in the game that best reflects the 3D API, the game designer does not have to consider the characteristics of a specific graphics card, but only develops the game according to the interface standard of the 3D API. When the game is running, it is directly called through the 3D API. The hardware resources of the graphics card. Currently, the main 3D APIs for personal computers are DirectX and OpenGL. DirectX has become the mainstream of the game. Most of the mainstream games on the market are based on DirectX development, such as "Imperial Age 3", "Far Cry", "Call of Duty 2", "Half Life2" and other popular excellent games. OpenGL is currently used mainly in professional graphics workstations. In the history of games, it has also been courted with DirectX, resulting in a large number of excellent games, such as "Quake3", "Half Life", the first few of the "Medal of Honor", "Counter Strike", etc., currently under the step of DirectX step by step, the use of OpenGL games has become less and less, but there are also many classic masterpieces, such as OpenGL-based "DOOM3" and the use of DOOM3 engine "Quake4", etc. Regardless of the past or the present, OpenGL's main representative of the game is the famous ID Software.

·OpenGL

Following DirectX, OpenGL is the next most popular 3D API. In fact, OpenGL has a longer time than DirectX. Compared to DirectX, it can only be applied to Microsoft's platform. OpenGL can be applied to many different operating systems. At present, most of the 3D acceleration games under Linux use OpenGL, so the latest drivers for nVIDIA can be adapted to most games with only minor changes. The 3D API under Linux is based on OpenGL. OpenGL is a professional 3D program interface. It is a powerful 3D graphics library with convenient calling. The predecessor of OpenGL was SGI's IRIS GL for its graphics workstations. IRIS GL is an industry-standard 3D graphics software interface. Although powerful but not portable, SGI has developed OpenGL based on IRIS GL.

The full name of OpenGL in English is "Open Graphics Library", as its name implies, OpenGL is "open graphical program interface". Although DirectX is the leading player in the home market, OpenGL is a protagonist that cannot be replaced in the professional high-end graphics field. OpenGL is a hardware-independent software interface that can be ported between different platforms such as Windows 95, Windows NT, Unix, Linux, MacOS, and OS/2. Therefore, software that supports OpenGL is very portable and can be used in a very wide range of applications. Since OpenGL is the underlying graphics library for 3D graphics, no geometric entity primitives are provided and cannot be used directly to describe the scene. However, through some conversion programs, it is convenient to convert DFX and 3DS model files made by 3D graphics design software such as AutoCAD and 3DS into OpenGL vertex arrays.

OpenGL is not free software, its copyright, trademark (the name OpenGL) is owned by SGI. But under Linux there is a replacement for OpenGL: Mesa. Mesa provides an almost identical interface to OpenGL, and there is almost no difference to anyone who uses the OpenGL API to program. Mesa is a free software that follows the GPL (partly following the LGPL), and it is because of Mesa's freedom that it exceeds OpenGL in terms of support for new hardware. Mesa is available at www.mesa3d.org. The most commonly used tool for developing OpenGL programs under Linux is GLUT (The OpenGL Utility Toolkit). It can create one or more OpenGL windows, respond to, handle user interactions, simple pop-up menus, and some built-in drawing and font handling features. Like OpenGL, GLUT can be ported to multiple platforms. Due to its good performance, it has now become one of the standard suites released by Mesa.

·DRI, full name Direct Rendering Infrastructure, is a framework for allowing applications to directly access display devices in a safe and efficient manner in the X Window System. It includes changes to the X server, some X client libraries, and the kernel. The first major application of DRI was to create a fast OpenGL implementation. DRI is part of XFree86 4.x and its successor X.org and is part of Mesa - an open source implementation of the OpenGL API. Some 3D acceleration drivers are written to DRI standards, including ATI, Matrox, 3DFX and Intel. DRI was originally developed by Precision Insight, Inc. (PI) under the cooperation and partial funding of Red Hat Inc. and SGI. DPI is now being maintained by Tungsten Graphics Inc. as PI was acquired by VA Linux and later VA Linux exited the Linux space. The company was created by some of the original DRI developers at PI. Tungsten Graphics is currently the focus of all DRI development, and many open source developers continue to contribute code to DRI through the DRI project on sourceforge.